Product Description

"You gotta git your minds fixed," the rural preacher tells Sunday School children. And the best way to do that fixin' is from Old Testament stories narrated by the preacher, played by a black cast, backed by the joyful gospel sounds of the Hall Johnson Choir and based on Marc Connelly's folk-themed Pulitzer Prize-winning play. Rex Ingram portrays de Lawd, who has a 100,000 things to do before any human's next breath - like instructing Noah (Eddie Anderson); taking counsel with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; or teaching Moses tricks to dazzle Pharaoh. Get your mind fixed for The Green Pastures. It's a film of its time. But like all great art, it transcends it.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #14579 in DVD
• Brand: Warner Brothers
• Released on: 2006-01-10
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Subtitled, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .25 pounds
• Running time: 93 minutes

Features

• "You gotta git your minds fixed," the rural preacher tells Sunday School children. And the best way to do that fixin' is from Old Testament stories narrated by the preacher, played by a black cast, backed by the joyful gospel sounds of the Hall Johnson Choir and based on Marc Connelly's folk-themed Pulitzer Prize-winning play.Rex Ingram portrays de Lawd, who has a 100,000 things to do before any h

Amazon.com
"Gangway for de Lawd God Jehovah!" Despite racial stereotypes and a naive, backward vision of "Negro Heaven," The Green Pastures remains an important, controversial, and still-entertaining milestone in African American popular culture. Because this 1936 spiritual musical embraces all of the black stereotypes that were prevalent in its time, Warner Home Video has appropriately included a disclaimer regarding the political incorrectness of the film's then-common racial prejudices, stressing the importance of acknowledging these stereotypes as opposed to pretending they never existed. With this understanding, The Green Pastures still endures as a classic American folk drama, based on Marc Connelly's Pulitzer Prize-wining Broadway production (suggested by Roark Bradford's southern sketches "Ol' Man Adam an' His Chillun"), in which several Old Testament stories are performed as they might be imagined by black Sunday-school child in the Depression-era South. It's an all-black vision of heaven as a perpetual fish-fry, full of black angels and cherubs eating catfish and smoking 10-cent "see-gars," where "De Lawd" (Rex Ingram) presides over the tales of creation: Noah and the Flood; Joshua at Jericho; Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; Adam and Eve; Moses and Pharaoh; etc. With heavenly accompaniment by the Hall Johnson Choir, these Bible stories play like a lavish fantasy revival, and while the stereotypical images and all-black colloquialisms may seem absurdly regressive from the perspective of latter-day enlightenment, there's no denying that The Green Pastures is still a transcendently joyful celebration of faith. As a relic of its time, it's a vivid (and for some, still uncomfortable) reminder that racial stereotypes--even in a joyful gospel context--can teach us a lot about where we've been, and where we've yet to go. --Jeff Shannon

On the DVD
The Green Pastures is accompanied by an excellent DVD commentary in which actor/director LeVar Burton and African American cultural scholars Herb Boyd and Ed Guerrero (author of Framing Blackness: The African American Image in Film) place the film in proper historical context. Burton candidly explains why he could never watch Green Pastures in its entirety until he gained the detached perspective of an actor/director, while Boyd and Guerrero relate many of the precedents and milestones that inform such '30s-era movies as The Green Pastures and Cabin in the Sky. Entertaining and informative, their commentary is essential listening for anyone seeking an enlightened perspective on racial stereotypes of the past. Also included, for similar historical appreciation, are two Vitaphone shorts from the early 1930s: "Rufus Jones for President" is a lively "two-reeler" (20 minutes) in which the 7-year-old future Rat Pack star Sammy Davis Jr. sings and dances (along with blues great Ethel Waters) as a young boy who fantasizes about becoming President of the United States. "An All-Colored Vaudeville Show" delivers just what the title promises: a stage revue of black performers including Broadway star Adelaide Hall and the legendary tap-dancing Nicholas Brothers. Both shorts represent all that was good--and bad--about Depression-era show business as a vibrant showcase for African American performers and the social conditions through which they endured. --Jeff Shannon

Customer Reviews

Glory ... glory
I admit the first time I saw this film, my skin crawled just a little bit at the accents and stereotypes -- Heaven is a perpetual fish fry!

But as the film progressed and the simple, beautiful vision plays out, it's like the stories triumphs over all the 1930s Hollywood prejudice and takes us places few other films ever seem to approach.

Just to clarify the story ... it's supposed to be how one of the black children, hearing the story of Genesis for the first time, envisions it by placing all the Biblical characters in his or her environment. It's charming and funny and just a fine simple entertainment with some wonderful authentic gospel music ... and then ...

... and then Rex Ingram as "Da Lawd" visits earth to find out why men keep praying to him when he's long ago forsaken them. He meets a soldier named Hezdrel (Rex Ingram in another role) who explains how mankind as discoved mercy ... then he marches off to his death, leaving God standing there, stunned by the lesson he has just learned!

Suddenly, it's not funny or sweet any more but a powerful statement of faith ... a faith that overcomes the worst of Hollywood's prejudices and always leaves me gasping for breath as the scene in Heaven dissolves back to the Sunday School class and into one of the greatest single shots in movie history.

This is a great and powerful movie ... and like so many other posters here, I'm begging for somebody to bring it out in DVD ... preferably somebody like Criterion, which would do it right.

Has You Been Redeemed?
This awe-inspiring film has been one of my favorites since childhood, when I watched it on a Sunday morning that I was too sick to go to church (or did the Devil get in me? ). Full of humor and precious moments, wonderful performances, and simply amazing theatre-like staging; I've grown to appreciate this movie more and more as I get older. The all-black cast rises far above the stereotypes which so easily could have ruined the film, interestingly by seeming to apply the powerful lessons of humility and loving obedience which De Lawd expects.

The memorable scenes are too numerous to record, ranging from the powerful (De Lawd, in plantation-owner finery, strolling through heaven, chanting "Has you been redeemed? Has you been baptized?...") to the hilarious (the angel Gabriel, putting his lips to the horn, as he anticipates De Lawd's wrath).

A wonderful family film.

Watch This Before You Die!
This is an absolute must see film. As with all art forms there are masterpieces that should be experienced by as many people as possible and missed by as few as possible. This is one of them. It is one of a kind. You will never see anything even remotely aproaching it's unique apeal. Everyone I know who has seen this movie has a different specific reaction, but generally speaking, it has made them all smile in the remembrance of it. And I can think of no higher praise for a movie than that. Don't miss it.